April Home Sales Continue and Strong Upward Trend
May 12th, 2012We are on a roll! After recording a 29.5% increase in March sales (there were a few late postings that increased the total), local residential real estate sales for April were up 18.8% putting the year to date increase at 16.2%. The average selling price in April was up 7.6% to $258,134 and for the year is at $253,433, an increase of 5.6%. Heading into the busy four month period of May through August when almost half of the years sales occur, we have a good jump on it and a lot of momentum with 552 homes under contract at the end of April.
Sales of homes priced above $500,000 continued to improve with seventeen closed in April bringing the year to date to 52 compared to just 27 last year.
The only red flag is the shortage of inventory. At the end of April there were 1,483 active listings but with 552 of them under contract there is a net of 931 homes available compared to 914 at the end of March. We expect a demand for up to 350 homes per month for the next four months so there is just a 2.6 month supply but 60% of this demand will be for homes priced under $250,000 and with 412 active listings in this price range there is less than a two month supply. To compare, sales of homes priced above $500,000 have been very good lately but there is still a one year supply on the market.

For the rest of the region, sales in theLovelandarea are up 9% for the month and 15.8% for the year to date. The average selling price for April is up 1% and is at $261,550 for the year, an increase of 1.8%. InWeldCounty, April sales were down 3.9% but the average selling price increased 10.7%. For the year, sales are up 1.3% and the average selling price has increased 7.9% to $195,731. There are 274 homes under contract in theLovelandarea and another 546 inWeldCountyso there is a lot of momentum in these markets also but they are short of inventory also.
Overall, a very good report and there seems to be a lot of energy in the market so we expect further increases in sales and pricing over the next few months.




